If you are a fashion designer or illustrator, you know how important it is to keep up with the latest trends and styles in the industry. But how do you find reliable and relevant sources of inspiration online? Here are some tips and tools to help you research fashion trends and styles online.
One of the easiest ways to research fashion trends and styles online is to browse online magazines that cover the latest news, events, and collections in the fashion world. You can find online versions of popular print magazines, such as Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Elle, and InStyle, or explore digital-only magazines, such as Fashionista, The Cut, and Who What Wear. Online magazines can give you a broad overview of the current and upcoming trends, as well as showcase different styles from various designers, celebrities, and influencers.
Better than just online magazines…go directly to higher end stores online. I love using marketplaces that show a variety of designers and I have a few I always go back to because their images are so fab. Barneys, Netaporter, Revolve, the Iconic are all great places to look for a variety of categories. Scrolling through these websites can help you more easily spot the overarching trends because they just keep popping up as you go through the pages!
Another way to research fashion trends and styles online is to follow social media platforms that feature fashion content. You can use Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok, and YouTube to discover and save images and videos of outfits, accessories, and styling tips. You can also follow hashtags, accounts, and influencers that match your niche and aesthetic. Social media can help you find fresh and diverse ideas, as well as interact with other fashion enthusiasts and professionals.
In this internet times and personality, many ways has change to different approach such as looking for "a trend" in social media. There is nothing wrong here, because social media had build to bring more visual data as fast pace as possible. Social media bring everyone in the community to create and bring a new trends everytimes. That is way, social media can be a place to create and yet see what following trends which happen right now. However, because of the fast pace. Social media cannot be the one of the thing to pursuit long term trends, it can be happen for just a short term of period and not sustain enough. You can see the trend change in fast on social media world but not in how the people tendency as a whole.
If you want to dive deeper into the analysis and commentary of fashion trends and styles, you can check out blogs and podcasts that focus on fashion topics. Blogs and podcasts can offer you more detailed and personal insights, opinions, and stories about fashion trends and styles. You can find blogs and podcasts that cater to different niches, such as sustainable fashion, street style, vintage fashion, or couture. Some examples of popular fashion blogs and podcasts are The Business of Fashion, Man Repeller, The Sartorialist, and Wardrobe Crisis.
If you want to learn more about the history, theory, and practice of fashion trends and styles, you can enroll in online courses and webinars that teach you various aspects of fashion design and illustration. Online courses and webinars can help you improve your skills, knowledge, and creativity in fashion. You can find online courses and webinars that cover topics such as fashion history, fashion forecasting, fashion drawing, fashion styling, and fashion marketing. Some examples of online platforms that offer fashion courses and webinars are Skillshare, Udemy, Coursera, and MasterClass.
Finally, if you want to create and organize your own fashion trends and styles, you can use online tools and apps that help you design, sketch, and plan your fashion projects. Online tools and apps can help you generate and visualize your ideas, as well as share and collaborate with others. You can use online tools and apps that help you with tasks such as color palettes, mood boards, fabric patterns, fashion sketches, outfit combinations, and wardrobe management. Some examples of online tools and apps that are useful for fashion research are Adobe Color, Canva, CLO3D, Procreate, and Stylebook.
I use a combination of all of the above when doing trend research for my personal styling clients. I love keeping up to date with Vogue Runway which is an excellent app to analyse the catwalk shows. I also enjoy reading online magazines such as Vogue, Tatler, Glamour etc to see how they’ve interpreted the season’s trends. I also enjoy blogs such as Who What Wear and social media platforms such as Instagram and Pinterest to search for relevant trends. I will use a combination of these resources to create my own sustainable interpretation of the trends, (using my fashion industry experience) to share trends likely to have longevity for my clients wardrobes. I then write this up in a blog post, and share in an online trend presentation.